Detention of 22 people over sale of Apple private data raises privacy fears in mainland China
A crackdown on a massive data-selling syndicate run by Apple-linked employees in China this week has renewed concern over privacy issues on the mainland. Chinese authorities detained 22 people – 20 of them employees of an Apple “domestic direct sales company and outsourcing company” – over the weekend for selling computer and phone users’ personal data, the Cangnan country police department in Zhejiang province said on its website earlier this week. The suspects allegedly used the US technology giant’s internal computer system to gather users’ names, phone numbers, Apple IDs and other data, which they sold as part of a scam worth more than 50 million yuan (US$7.4 million) . In a statement issued on Wednesday, Cangan police said they detained the suspects after months of investigation alongside officers from Guangdong, Jiangsu, and Fujian provinces. The statement did not specify whether the data belonged to Chinese or foreign Apple customers. An Apple spokesman declined to comment on the matter. The local police did not respond to requests for comment. The 20 Apple-linked employees worked in the direct sales company and with its outsourced service suppliers, allegedly charging between 10 and 180 yuan for items of illegally extracted data. The crackdown raised public concern over privacy issues as Apple products are highly popular in China, with iPhones being Chinese users’ top choice for mobile web surfing. Apple shared 9.6 per cent of the mainland smartphone market, according to a report this year from the International Data Corporation, a market research company.
